1. Field of the Invention
Therapeutic compositions and methods for treating cancer are provided. In particular, therapeutic compositions and methods related to inhibition of FAM83A (family with sequence similarity 83) are provided. Methods for diagnosing breast cancer resistance to EGFR inhibitors are also provided.
2. Background
A. Breast Cancer
Cancer is a major public health problem throughout the world. In women, breast cancer is the most common malignancy. In year 2006, over 180,000 new cases and 40,000 breast cancer-related deaths have been reported in the United States alone (Jemal et al. 2007). The overall death rate of patients with breast cancer has declined during the past decade due to early detection of the disease by mammographic screening and implementation of adjuvant systemic treatment (Mettlin 1999; Jemal et al. 2007). However, a substantial number of patients acquire resistance to treatment, which is followed by a rapid relapse of the disease (Ranson et al. 2002; Dancey 2004; Hortobagyi 2004; Nahta et al. 2006). Although recent advancement in breast cancer research has contributed to our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying the disease, delineating how breast cancer cells become refractory to treatment and identifying proper therapeutic targets still remain a challenge.
Breast cancer is a diagnostically heterogeneous disease with different types and has been categorized into ˜18 histological types and ˜5 molecular subtypes (Perou et al. 2000). Breast cancer research has progressed our understanding of the molecular mechanisms of tumorigenesis and many therapeutic strategies have been developed. Some examples of therapies include inhibitors of receptor tyrosine kinases such as lapatinib (Rusnak et al. 2001) and humanized blocking antibodies against oncogenic receptors such as Trastuzumab (Herceptin) to block the signals that would otherwise instruct the cells to become disorganized within the tissue and grow out of control.